NYC pols to Albany: Legalize It

Public Advocate Jumaane Williams addresses reporters at a press conference on Thursday about supporting marijuana legalization. Eagle photo by Victoria Merlino

By Victoria Merlino

After failing to fully legalize marijuana in the last state legislative session, advocates and lawmakers are reigniting the effort to remove weed from the penal code and end the deep racial disparities in marijuana arrests.

“There’s no reason except for pure political will that this is not done,” said Public Advocate Jumaane Williams on the steps of City Hall on Thursday. 

Williams was surrounded by legalization advocates who called on the state legislature to pass the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act, which would legalize recreational marijuana usage for New Yorkers over the age of 21. The bill faced opposition from senators representing Long Island, Brooklyn and Westchester, as well as Queens State Sen. Toby Ann Stavisky during the last session. 

The act never made it to a floor vote, though a “decriminalization” bill was passed to reduce penalties for teeny possession and to expunge some low-level marijuana convictions in certain circumstances. Gov. Andrew Cuomo has previously expressed his support for legalizing marijuana.

State Sen. Liz Krueger, who sponsored the marijuana legalization bill, underscored the importance of the measure for communities of color who have felt the drastically disproportionate impact of marijuana-related arrests. As the Eagle reported in August, black and Latinx New Yorkers accounted for nearly every low-level marijuana arrest in the first half of the year. 

“This is an issue of economic fairness to black and communities, to expunging the records of people who got caught up in the drug wars for doing something frankly no different than the white kids in my district have been doing for ever and ever,” Krueger said. “In making sure that when we build a new, legal economic engine that can ensure jobs for people in all communities with a focus on the communities that were done the most harm by the drug wars.”

With the state legalization bill in limbo, the City Council passed a bill in April to ban most employers in New York City from conducting marijuana testing. 

“This is a social justice issue. This is a criminal justice issue. This is not simply a marijuana issue,” Queens and Brooklyn Councilmember Antonio Reynoso said at the rally. “We will not support a half-assed plan when it comes to the work we need to do, when it comes to marijuana legalization.”